In Colombiers, in the south of France, EDF Renewables supervises all solar power plants, onshore and offshore wind farms, throughout the world. Recently, we have also found the Repair Lab, a 400m² workshop in which large wind turbine components are repaired. Video immersion.
The Repair Lab: a workshop for our strategic parts
A few steps from the Colombiers supervision center is the Repair Lab. A 400 m² workshop in which four specialists assess and repair huge wind turbine parts from EDF Renewables' European parks. The workshop, inaugurated on January 18, is made up, among other things, of an overhead crane capable of lifting parts weighing up to 25 tonnes, such as main shafts and multipliers; major components of the mechanical transmission of wind turbines.
The primary mission of the Repair Lab teams who work in this new building, which looks like a mega-warehouse, is to analyze the causes of failure of these so-called “strategic” parts. When one of them fails and cannot be repaired on site, it is immediately sent to the Repair Lab for expertise and repair, before being sent to a storage center.
It will be reused later on another wind turbine requiring replacement. In the meantime, the teams in charge of maintenance and asset management at EDF Renewables replace the part being repaired with an identical part from the same storage center. A way to keep our assets down for the shortest time.
Regular analyzes of defective components make it possible to refine the monitoring carried out by the remote monitoring teams at the e-Diagnostic Center, as well as the maintenance of technicians in the field. For mechanical engineering teams, it is also a way to prepare for future obsolescence of these components.
Maintaining the parts of tomorrow and extending the lifespan of our installations
The Repair Lab plays a central role in EDF Renewables' circular economy strategy, but also in the maintenance strategy of its wind farms. Today, this workshop makes it possible to extend the lifespan of equipment and reduce the quantity of waste produced, while reducing the carbon footprint of fleet maintenance. Tomorrow, thanks to its surface area and its 25-ton overhead crane, it will make it possible to repair and assess parts from new generation wind turbines, with larger components.